


night in the lonesome October

by LivingInSmilesIsBetter (axm)



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, F/M, Halloween, Post-Movie: The X-Files: Fight the Future (1998), Season/Series 06
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:55:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27174850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/axm/pseuds/LivingInSmilesIsBetter
Summary: There are auditory reminders. Mulder yelling her name, once, twice. The second time, hoarser, more desperate. Fear. Warning. Anger.There is a reminder on her lips. A reminder of his lips pressed to hers. Soft skin, firm pressure, and the low hum of approval buzzing from one hot, open mouth to the other.And then there’s the reminder this could have all been avoided if she hadn’t crawled out of bed this morning. If she hadn’t answered her phone. If she had just said no.
Relationships: Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 6
Kudos: 23
Collections: X-Files Horror Fanfic Exchange (2020)





	night in the lonesome October

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OnlyTheInevitable](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnlyTheInevitable/gifts).



> My word for the horror-themed exchange was “knife”, prompted by the lovely OnlyTheInevitable, who requested: Post-cancer arc, pre-All Things. So, I bring you a story set Halloween, 1998, in between FTF and The Beginning. Mulder and Scully are off the X-Files, because they were burned to the fricking ground. They’ve just returned from Antarctica. The Yankees have won the world series, it was a waxing gibbous moon that night, and the number one song was The First Night by Monica – and while only the moon phase has any relevance, The First Night pushed One Week off the #1 spot on Oct 18th 1998, which at least had an X-Files mention in it.  
> None of the landmarks mentioned in this fic exist. It’s S6 – so just settle in and imagine some random Los Angeles area landmarks instead of Alexandria and this will be a much more enjoyable experience (apologies to Alexandria).

There are moments in life when time passes at an almost glacial pace. The long, cold night before Christmas. The hot, endless summers in San Diego. The slow, almost torturous path to graduating high school. The 1.5 miles every rookie runs to pass the FBI Physical Fitness Test.  
And then there are the things that happen in the blink of an eye, without warning, so fast that the aftermath is just blurred images burned behind closed eyes, and a searing pain across injured skin.

There are auditory reminders as well. Mulder yelling her name, once, twice. The second time, hoarser, more desperate. Fear. Warning. Anger.

There is a reminder on her lips. A reminder of his lips pressed to hers. Soft skin, firm pressure, and the low hum of approval buzzing from one hot, open mouth to the other.

And then there’s the reminder this could have all just been avoided if she hadn’t crawled out of bed this morning. If she hadn’t answered her phone. If she had just said no.

* * *

“Ah, Virginia. Smell that country air, Scully.”

She breathed in through her nose, only to be met with fumes from car exhausts and boats. “We’re in the middle of Alexandria,” she reminded him, her nose crinkling a little as her senses were assaulted.

“Smell that ocean air then.”

She inhaled, the timing of the breath accidental, and caught a lungful of cigarette smoke from the holidaymakers waiting to board a scenic boat tour of the harbor. Her life was a sitcom with canned laughter so forced that at times all it did was make her cringe.

Mulder saw her cough quietly behind her hand. “It’s nice being so close to home for a change. No airports, no red-eyes.” He smirked. “No motels.”

Twenty-five minutes, depending on traffic, and she would be home. Even less for him. It was rare to not have to worry about the mystery stains on the motel bedspread. The weird damp feeling of the floor beneath her toes. That stale odor of cigarettes and wet dog that permeated every inch of a cheap motel room.

She would see none of that tonight if all went to plan. Instead, she would return to her home, likely late, through a door that would have had an endless stream of unanswered knocks over the course of the evening.  
It was October 31st. Halloween. Orange and black decorations adorned homes and businesses around them. Pumpkins sat on doorsteps with macabre faces carved deep into the flesh. Kids would be trick or treating once night fell, less than an hour from now. Parents would be handing out candy and commenting politely on costumes. And she… she would be investigating the case of a typical stabbing, because she hadn’t had it in her to say no.  
Mulder swore it was an X-File. Not that it mattered. They were off the X-Files, off of what little still existed of all the case files they’d once had stored in the now scorched basement office. They shouldn’t even be here right now. And it was why they were. No expenses to explain. Just a nice drive on a quiet evening. Because Mulder thought it was an X-File, and Scully hadn’t put her foot down and refused to follow him.

The man had traveled to Antarctica for her. How could she say no to a quick jaunt to Virginia? Even if he had turned up on her doorstep at 4pm without warning and she had already poured the two bags of candy into a bowl.

Scully gazed out over the inner harbor, taking in the calm waters dotted with sight-seeing boats. There were worse places she could be right now. Like still missing, isolated, unconscious and alone, in the cold, dark place.  
Turning back to Mulder, she placed her hands on her hips, and said, “So, tell me about this knife, Mulder.” No office, no projector, meant no slide show. The interior of the car during the drive down to Alexandria had been imbued with awkwardness. Not an obvious kind, but what little conversation they’d had about the stabbing, and Mulder's vague mention of some mysterious knife, had been stilted with longer silences than was usual for them.

She knew why.

They both did.

She stared at Mulder now, hands on hips, one eyebrow cocked, awaiting an answer.

Mulder pushed his hands deep into his pockets. “You ever taken much notice of Virginia’s flag and seal?”

His tone had been light, the question meant as a joke. She answered what she suspected was rhetorical. “Of course, Mulder.”

He moved a hand from a pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He handed it to her without a word.

Scully unfolded the paper and then met his eyes. “It’s-“

“A parazonium.”

“Which is what I was about to say. What about it, Mulder?”

Mulder shrugged. “It’s missing.”

She folded the paper back up and handed it back to him. “It’s missing?”

His eyes shone with the childlike glee that often preceded an exuberant explanation.

“There’s a blink and you’ll miss it museum just a short stroll from here. Not a lot of standout pieces in it.” He raised his eyebrows. “Except one.”

“The parazonium.”

“From Rome. Circa 200 AD. Give or take a few years.”

“So now for the obvious question…”

“How is this an X-File?”

Scully nodded.

“Legend says this particular dagger has magical properties.”

The sound of distaste left her lips before she could stop it. “I’m sorry I asked,” she drawled, her tone dry.

Mulder ignored her tone. “It’s claimed one scratch from the blade gives a person courage to do anything they’ve always wanted to do but couldn’t.”

“So, the person stabbed this morning? You think the parazonium was used?"

"I do."

"Wielded by someone who wanted courage to kill a person?"

Mulder shrugged. “Maybe it was an accident. Maybe whoever cut them and took off with the blade pushed it just a little too deep. What I do know, is it’s missing, along with the killer, and what else were you going to do today? Background checks? You don’t have use of the lab until tomorrow.”

The lab, where she would be running tests on whatever had infected her in Antarctica. She knew what he would rather be doing. Examining every burnt piece of paper he had collected from the ashes of his office. It was all he had been doing since they’d returned to DC. But the lines between his eyes, the tension headache the scrutiny had given him, was evidence even Mulder had accepted he had needed an afternoon’s break from it.

“How, pray tell, are you going to investigate this without it getting back to Kersh?” His silence answered the question. Scully took a step closer to him, but the volume of her voice only increased. “By not informing local PD, Mulder, you’re in violation of state laws prohibiting contamination of a crime scene.”

“I’m aware.”

“Good. And I’ll make sure you’re aware of this at every crime scene until you start doing things by the book.”

Mulder almost laughed at that. “And I’ll start doing that once our suspects are of this world.”

“Related to that,” she began, taking another step closer to him, “we need to tread very carefully here. I’m running the tests on the virus tomorrow. With the meeting just days away it would be dangerous for us to be at all reckless right now.”

“And when you have those results and prove the virus is extra-terrestrial we won’t have to sneak around.”

“I will prove there’s a scientific basis for what you saw. And I will have those results before we’re called in. And that is all the more reason to not get caught.”

“It’s one evening, Scully. One little dagger.”

Because she hadn’t heard words like those before. “Like it was a nice trip to the forest, or like it was a quiet town where nothing ever happened in Pennsylvania?”

“Look, I’m curious, okay? A mystical knife. That’s new, even for us.” He tilted his head slightly. “You didn’t have to come.”

“Yeah, well no matter what the FBI says we’re still partners.”

Her words brought a smile to Mulder’s lips. “Always.”

She had almost kissed those lips a week ago. More than that, almost two weeks now. Or was it closer to three? The missing time between the almost kiss in his hallway, and waking up in a hospital bed in Christchurch, New Zealand, had left her disorientated. There were flashes of vague memories, bits and pieces that seemed like they must be part of some non-linear senseless dream. Mulder’s face inches from hers in some dark, cold place; a vast, white landscape; a cold like nothing she had ever experienced; then the running; still cold; Mulder, face-down in the snow, her arms like lead as she pulled his body to hers; still cold, so cold. Finally, the hospital room. Warm again. Especially her hand, which she had soon found was encased by Mulder’s. Two days later both had been on a plane bound for Los Angeles, and then another to D.C. Everything was muted, a whole collection of memories shrouded by the effects of the virus on her body. But the almost kiss. Leaning into him, his own lips lined up with her. A whisper of a brush of lip against lip. Just a tease. Not enough. That she remembered. And with the missing time it felt like it was just a few days ago.

Scully huffed out a sigh. “Show me the crime scene.”

* * *

The scene of the crime was a poorly lit park a block from the museum. During the day it was a lively spot, where families sat and ate their lunch and kids played. Or so Mulder told her. And at night it was avoided by anyone who knew better than to walk through a dark park alone. Now, at dusk, it was empty. Police tape cordoned off the area the death had occurred, and a tarp covered the blood that remained. A crew would be in soon to clean up. A lone guard stood near the tarp, his body language enough to keep any rubberneckers away. Not enough to deter Mulder though.

“Mulder you can’t just—” Scully hissed, but her sentence was cut off by Mulder doing exactly what she was about to tell him not to.

Story of her life.

“FBI,” Mulder said, flashing his badge at the guard. “We’re helping track down the knife. Mind if we take a look?”

The guard only needed to glance at the badge to allow anything Mulder might need. Scully refused to flash her own badge, choosing instead to keep it tucked away as she ducked under the tape Mulder was holding up for her. The guard merely nodded at her as she passed.

Without glancing back at the guard again Scully quickly removed a pair of gloves from her pocket and lifted the tarp, revealing the dark bloodstain on the otherwise green grass.

“What do you think, Scully?” Mulder asked. “More than a scratch?”

“He bled out,” she replied. There was so much blood.

“They say the knife’s probably in the harbor,” the guard offered, watching them work. “Suspect likely took off in a boat.”

“Maybe,” Mulder mused.

“Mulder?”

“Scully, let’s say you scratched yourself with the dagger, and used that courage to kill a man. Would you then ditch the knife in the harbor? Or do you think with your newfound courage you might just take the murder weapon with you?”

Scully glanced over to see the guard watching them in interest. Before Mulder could say anything weird, she curled her hand around the crook of his elbow and steered him away from the guard, and the tarp, and lowered her voice. “If he wounded him – or her – self first, the suspect mightn’t have thought to ditch the weapon so yes. There’s a chance it’s still on his person.” She utterly refused to say anything about the knife’s mystical properties. Because none of that was real. Like the alien spaceship she had allegedly seen, or the beings Mulder swore chased them. There was a logical explanation, a scientific explanation, for it all. Including the knife.

“I say we let the detectives dredge the harbor while we go our own way.”

While Mulder had been speaking Scully had been studying the grass. They were a good twenty feet from the tarp now and beside her shoe was the unmistakable stain of blood in the grass. Whose? She wondered as she glanced away and searched the grass. Yes. There was more. “Mulder,” she began. She took a step away from him and scanned the ground. More. “Blood,” she finished, pointing down.

“Dripping from the knife?” Mulder pondered out loud as they walked together now, eyes searching the ground for another stain.

It was becoming less. The drips lighter, smaller on the grass. Scully stopped and looked up, Mulder's eyes following hers. Neither said a word as their eyes met. Mulder strode off ahead, and Scully followed, both making a straight line for the forested hill beyond the park.


End file.
